Happy 17th birthday James and here is hoping for many many more

Even the pandemic did not stop Mom and Dad from celebrating their anniversary at the Ford Garage restaurant in Dearborn. It was another beautiful late summer day in Michigan and the restaurant was not crowded at all, but we had reservations just in case. Mom enjoys the atmosphere at the restaurant in addition to the best burgers money can buy. Everything is based on cars which is cool and our favorite is the onion rings which come on an oil funnel. The burgers meals were plenty enough to eat but we always order the onion rings just for the photo opportunity.

Continue reading “18th Anniversary at the Ford Garage” →

We wish Mom a very happy birthday and hope for many many more.

The wait is over and despite the pandemic two Spirit Halloween stores opened near us so we stopped by to see what was new. Without a doubt the inventory was low as they only had about 25% of their inventory in but it was still fun and we purchased a hat, a hanging banner, a couple styrofoam tombstones, and a pennywise mat which looks like pennywise is looking up at you through a sewer grate.

We look forward to when they have all their inventory in but we were very impressed with the scenery they have put up already especially the large flaming things which were (unfortunately) not for sale.

Continue reading “First Halloween Store Opens 2020” →

After weeks of work James finished a huge Ravensburger puzzle in the garage. Since camp was drastically shortened and the Magic Get Together in Colon cancelled, the entire family found themselves with extra time and James took advantage of it by putting together the largest puzzle in family history. The garage still has puzzles that were put together decades earlier by James’ Aunt Peg and James’ dad hanging on the wall.

We were all proud that James took his time and put together this huge puzzle and he plans to do one a little bigger in the future, a 32,000 piece puzzle.

The seventies station (7 on satellite radio) played the top 700 songs of the seventies during the 4th of July weekend.

This made it very interesting for us having the 70’s playing in the background all weekend and while each of us picked what we thought would be #1, none of us were right (James thought Three Dog Night “Joy to the World”, Mom thought Captain & Tenniles “Love Will Keep Us Together” and Dad thought Simon & Garfunkels “Bridge over Troubled Waters).

While it appears that the European Hard Rock Bands were ignored (Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Yes, etc) below are the top 25 as voted on by the seventies on seven listeners but before you click, what 70’s song do you think won. Continue reading “Top Songs of the 70’s” →

A beautiful but hot day on this Fourth of July. There is still no baseball so this may be the first time I missed a 4th of July Tiger game in my life. We are listening to satellite radio, the 700 greatest hits are counting down from the 70’s and right now they are at 180. I will try to remember to update this and let you know which song wins. Mom is going with “Love will Keep us together” and Dad is going with “Bridge over Troubled Water”. (I do not know if hard rock is on there or I would go with Stairway to Heaven)

James worked all day on his 5,000 piece puzzle which is the largest he ever tackled. The prior record was a 2,000 piece puzzle. We have three tables in the garage to hold the puzzle, what we are going to do with it once its complete has not been determined because it is huge.

Fireworks galore tonight, since all city and state firework shows have been cancelled due to covid, the people are putting on their own and doing a great job, sounds like a war zone as I type this.

With covid going on we have not had many visitors to the house, this kitty being the exception. For as long as we have had kitties they have had visitors. They mostly just stare at each other but their tails are not always in the air (a cat with its tail straight up in the air means that are willing to be sociable with other cats).

We (the humans in the family) also appreciate the visitors since the scent of a cat will keep squirrels away from digging up Moms bulbs in the garden.

Well I was promised a surprise for Fathers day and I certainly got one, a kitty litter cake. It was actually delicious as it was made from several European style chocolates including German and was delicious despite its look. The nasty turds in the kitty litter cake were made from tootsie rolls and were the only thing I simply could not bring myself to eat, so they were decorative only.

Mom got the recipe on the internet and made a special trip to the store to get the ingredients (going to the store these days is no fun).

All in all it was a great day with Boneyard takeout – about an $80 meal – to enjoy.

Well the covid virus certainly delayed work on this as we had to live with the black top and a mound of dirt for a lawn for nearly 6 months. Upon doing the final work, they broke off a sprinkler head and the cement poured was not straight so we had to complain to DTE and they said someone would come out in about 3 weeks and redo the work so this event may not be over for us for some time. When they seeded the lawn they did try to repair the sprinkler head but they were unable to do so as they were not equipped to handle much more that seeds and dirt.

We will see what happens and hopefully DTE will make it right, remember we just got sod last year and had we known this was going to happen we never would have gotten it. Continue reading “DTE Finishing Up 2020” →